by I. T. Lucas
Was he trying to come on to her again?
She’d given him plenty of hints that she wasn’t interested. “I have a workshop at four that I need to attend. But maybe I’ll check out the lodge after that.” She brushed a strand of hair off her face. “See you Tuesday.”
“You’re not working tomorrow?”
“Monday is my day off.”
He eyed her curiously. “Have fun tonight.”
“Thanks.”
Hopefully, he wasn’t going to look for her at the lodge. Not that it mattered if he saw her with Sam. She was free to choose whoever she pleased.
Pulling her coat off the hook, Ana draped it over her arm and stepped out into the hallway.
Compared to the laundry room's heat and humidity, the corridor was much cooler, but she was still too sweaty to put the coat on.
Ana had never worked faster than she had today, finishing all of the ten rooms assigned to her in three hours. The time she’d managed to save could now be spent primping for her date with Sam.
And yes, this time, she was going to treat it as a date, and not just an opportunity to promote Safe Haven’s way.
If she’d read the signals correctly, and Ana believed that she had, then Sam was interested in more than just talking.
Last night, he’d held her hand and kissed her cheek. It wasn’t much, but it was significant. If Sam’s intentions were limited to only discussing ideology and trying to convince her that Safe Haven wasn’t the best place for her, he wouldn’t have kissed her.
So yeah, he had an agenda, but he was into her, and just in case today’s date ended up in his room, she needed to shave and trim and moisturize all those places that had been neglected for over a year.
Excitement warring with apprehension, Ana tossed her coat on her bed, took off her shoes, and walked into the tiny bathroom in her socks.
The shower enclosure leaked, so she had to put a towel on the floor before turning the water on, and then had to wait for the hot water to arrive. The modest lifestyle didn’t bother her, but Ana missed the luxurious bathtub she’d had in her father’s house.
Except, that place was gone.
After Ana had gone to college, her father had sold it and bought a new one that was even larger and fancier, but even though she had a room there, it had never become hers. On her rare visits, she’d felt like she was intruding on his new family and couldn’t wait to go back to the dorms, and later to the rented apartment she’d shared with two other law students.
Ana could’ve afforded a place of her own, but she had preferred having roommates to living alone. It hadn’t been about partying, the three of them had spent most of their time studying, but it was less lonely.
She wondered whether Megan and Linda missed her.
Probably not.
When she’d come back after graduating from the retreat and told them that she was moving out, they hadn’t even tried to talk her out of it. Megan had helped her pack, though, and Linda had driven her to the self-storage place and had helped her unload the boxes.
She missed them, but only a little.
During the two years she’d lived with Megan and Linda, she hadn’t gotten as close to them as she had to the new friends that she’d made in the community in less than three months.
With a sigh, Ana dumped the rest of her clothing into the laundry basket and stepped into the shower.
Taking her time, she shampooed and conditioned her hair and then got busy with the disposable razor. When she was done, she stepped out, wrapped a towel around her hair, shrugged her bathrobe on, and tied the belt around her waist before leaving the humid heat of the bathroom.
A soft knock sounded at her door. “Ana? Are you there?” Margaret sounded on the verge of panic.
Ana opened up and waved her friend in. “Come in quickly. I just stepped out of the shower.”
“Oh.” Margaret slipped in and closed the door behind her. “I heard that you came back early, and I was worried that you were feeling sick. When I knocked, and you didn’t answer, I started to hyperventilate. Is everything okay?”
“I’m fine. I just worked faster so I could have a longer break before the evening workshop.”
Letting out a breath, her friend plopped down on her bed. “I’m glad that you’re okay. Sandra is down with the flu, and so is Ryan. One of the retreat guests must have brought it from the outside, and pretty soon, we will all get sick.”
Margaret had a tendency to overreact.
“We should take an extra dose of the immune booster Shirley is raving about.” Ana pulled the towel off her head and draped it over the back of a chair.
“I’ve done that already.” Margaret eyed her curiously. “I’ve heard that you went on a walk with one of the guests last night.”
She should have known that Margaret would hear about it before she had a chance to tell her. There were no secrets in Safe Haven.
“I did.” Ana couldn’t help the smile tugging on her lips.
“How come you didn’t tell me that you were going to the lodge? I would have gone with you.”
“It was a spur of the moment thing.” The lie rolled off her tongue with ease. “I was sick of being a coward, so I thought I would check out the new guests. I met a guy, we went on a walk, had a nice talk, and then he escorted me back to the lodge.”
Margaret arched a brow. “And that’s all? I was hoping that you’d finally taken the plunge.”
Grabbing a comb, Ana sat next to Margaret on the bed. “I might tonight. I’m meeting him again.” She started working out the knots from her hair.
A grin spread over her friend’s gaunt face. “I’m so happy for you. Just remember not to get attached.”
“I won’t. He’s not the type who would stay after the retreat is over.”
“Good. It’s the hardest with the first few. It gets easier later.”
Ana snorted. “You talk as if you spend each night with a different guy. When was the last time you had some fun?”
“It has been a while. I’m just too tired most of the time.”
“That’s because you work too hard.”
“True.” Margaret pushed to her feet. “Which reminds me that I still have work to do. I’ll see you at the workshop.”
After she left, Ana felt a twinge of guilt for not telling her the truth about Sam.
The problem was that as good of a friend as Margaret was to her, she was a hundred percent loyal to the community. She would have had Sam kicked out, and Ana wasn’t ready to part with him yet.
29
Leon
As Leon waited by the door for Anastasia, he was getting curious glances from the staff members entering or leaving through the back entrance.
If the Safe Haven community was anything like the village, the rumor about him and Anastasia going on a walk together had already spread. Her friends probably assumed that the two of them were going to hook up tonight, or connect, as the cult liked to refer to casual sex.
Regrettably, that wasn’t going to happen, but it was precisely what he wanted them to think.
Looking out into the night through the glass door, he couldn’t see far even with his exceptional vision. Not only that, but all staff members were also wearing the same white puffer coat. Still, he had no problem recognizing Anastasia by the way she walked and her pink boots.
He opened the door, ignoring the cold air as he stood in the entrance wearing only a long-sleeved shirt.
The moment she realized it was him, Anastasia smiled and hurried her steps.
Her scarf wasn’t wrapped around her head or her neck, and even though her hair was wind-tousled, it looked as if she’d styled it. He also remembered her eyelashes as being lighter, but they were black now, and there was gloss on her lips.
Had she done it for him?
A sense of satisfaction washed over Leon at the realization that she had made an effort to look good for their date. Not that any of it was needed. She was a natural beauty.
; “I didn’t expect you to wait for me here.” Anastasia sounded breathless, and Leon wondered whether it was because she’d been rushing or because of the effect he had on her.
He reached for her hand. “Let’s go to my room.” Invading her personal space, he leaned to whisper in her ear, “We can talk privately in there.”
A blush spreading over her pale cheeks, she chuckled. “I've heard better come-on lines in my life. How about we grab a cup of coffee first, and maybe find a place to sit down and talk?”
“We can take the coffee to my room, and that’s not a come-on line.” He leaned down closer, so his cheek was almost brushing hers. “Given the lifestyle this place promotes, that would be much less suspicious than taking another walk to talk. I promise to be a perfect gentleman.”
Looking uncertain, she dragged her teeth over her bottom lip. “Okay.”
Thank the merciful Fates, the girl could be reasoned with. After last night, he hadn’t been sure about that.
“Let’s get that coffee.” He put his arm on her shoulders. “Put your arm around my waist. We need to look like we are about to connect.”
“Yeah, we do.” She still sounded a little breathy. “You are so tall. I wish I had heels.” Anastasia did as he asked and then leaned her head against his arm.
As an image of her in a black cocktail dress and stilettos flitted through his mind, he got instantly hard.
Thank fuck that his fangs behaved and didn’t elongate.
“I wish so too,” he murmured.
Anastasia sighed. “I hate being short. You are probably used to dating taller women.”
He looked down at her. “You are perfect the way you are.”
“You just said that you wished I wore heels.”
Way to go, dumbass.
A guy needed to be careful about what he said to a woman. Females had the annoying habit of interpreting the most innocent remarks in the worst possible way.
“You said it first, and your comment got my imagination going. I thought that you would look sexy as sin with a black cocktail dress and stilettos.” He smiled. “I usually don’t care about what women wear, but I think that would be a better look for you than all this white and pink fluff.”
He wanted to take the words back as soon as they left his mouth. What if she liked wearing white and pink and he’d just offended her again?
Thankfully, Anastasia nodded in agreement. “The uniforms are one of the things that I don’t love about this place, but I see the logic behind them. Paying too much attention to the way we look is frivolous and unproductive. The limited choices we have, in colors as well as in style, liberate us from an unhealthy obsession with unimportant stuff.”
Did she truly believe that, or was she just parroting her leader’s words?
Uniforms served a purpose, and that was to strip their wearers of their individuality. When in uniform, a person’s identity became their designation—a soldier, a firefighter, a nurse, a doctor. Except, at the end of their workday, people got to take the uniform off and become individuals again.
That didn’t happen in Safe Haven.
As they walked through the common room, Leon scanned the place for his teammates, but they weren’t there. Peter might be hunting the nurse down. He hadn’t learned anything useful from her, but he’d gotten an invitation to connect with her later.
If there was something shady going on in Safe Haven, nurse Shirley didn’t know about it. Either that or Emmett was such a powerful compeller that his victims believed to their very cores what he wanted them to believe.
Where was Eleanor, though?
She could have taken a guy to her room to interrogate, but she would need either Peter or him to thrall the dude later.
“Do you like cream in your coffee?” Anastasia asked.
“I take it black.”
She smiled. “Why am I not surprised? You are such a manly man.”
“Is that supposed to be a compliment?” He grabbed a couple of water bottles from the basket and stuffed them in his back pockets.
“Why wouldn’t it be?’
He shrugged. “In today’s world, I’m no longer sure. Men are expected to be more feminine, women are expected to be more masculine, and yet everyone is talking about accepting people the way they are. It’s confusing.”
Anastasia smiled triumphantly. “Can you see now why I want to live in Safe Haven? Nothing is confusing here. Everyone is accepted just the way they are.”
“Oh, yeah? What if someone does not want to participate in the free-love culture and wants to bond with a specific person, or start a family?”
“Then Safe Haven is not the place for them. All the rules are clearly explained, and if you accept them, you can join the community, and if you can’t or just don’t want to, you can leave. But you know precisely what’s expected from you, and you don’t have to second-guess anything.”
30
Anastasia
The guest rooms were larger and better appointed than those in the community compound, but not by much. There was still just one full-sized bed, a desk, a chair, and a dresser.
“You’ll be more comfortable on the bed.” Sam pulled out the chair and sat down.
Well, that solved the dilemma of where to sit.
“I hate to put a dent in this nicely stretched comforter,” she joked to hide her embarrassment.
He crossed his legs. “You can mess my bed up as much as you want.”
Was he hiding an erection?
She hoped so. If seeing her sitting on his bed had such an effect on him, then she wouldn’t have to work hard to seduce him.
Damn. Her cheeks heated up just thinking about that. Hopefully, she wouldn’t have to make the first move because she would probably spontaneously combust as soon as she attempted it. She’d never seduced a guy before.
The problem was that Sam had promised to be a perfect gentleman, so unless that had been a lie meant to lure her into his room, she would have no choice.
Great. Last night she’d accused him of being a liar, and now she was actually hoping that he was. Could he be just a little less than a perfect gentleman?
Mimicking his pose, Ana crossed her legs and leaned forward with the coffee cup cradled in her hands. “You wanted to talk.”
“I want to find out more about the voices you hear.”
“Why?”
“Maybe I can help you find out whether they are real or not. Do they bother you all day long?”
She shook her head. “Thank God, I only hear them before falling asleep when I’m just starting to doze off.”
He nodded. “Your mind is more receptive in that state, so it makes sense. What do they say?”
“It’s usually a conversation between two people, and I can hear both of them. Sometimes there is another person, but I can only hear two.”
“Males? Females? Couples?”
“Mostly, it’s couples. Sometimes they talk about mundane things like planning a vacation or making a grocery shopping list. And other times it’s life-changing events like proposing or admitting infidelity and leaving.”
“What about arguing? Revealing secrets?”
“If I hear arguments, I force myself fully awake because that upsets me. I don’t think that any of it was supposed to be a secret, other than the few cases of admitting infidelity, that is. But since about half of what I hear is in languages I can’t understand, I might have missed those.”
He chuckled. “It’s like you’re tuning in to an international radio station.”
“Maybe I do.” She took a sip from her coffee. “If that’s the explanation, it would be a huge relief. Are any of your cousins married to people who can pick up radio waves?”
“Good one, Anastasia. But no. No one I know can do that, but that doesn’t mean a talent like that doesn’t exist. Did you investigate that?”
“I trawled the internet, but you can’t trust the stuff people write there. Anyone can publish bullshit.”
“Th
at’s true.” He put his cup on the desk. “What about the tone of these voices?”
“What do you mean?”
“Do they sound like they are acting?”
“They sound real.”
“What languages other than English do you speak?”
“I know a little Spanish, and I studied Latin in school.”
He chuckled. “I would be really worried about you if any of those conversations were in Latin.”
“They weren’t.”
“What about Spanish?”
“A few.”
“Did you understand what was being said?”
“Some of it, yes.”
“Then that’s your proof. If you understood everything, you might have been making it up. But there were parts you didn’t understand.”
That had occurred to her, but regrettably, it wasn’t the irrefutable proof she needed.
“There might be another explanation for that. When I was little, we had a housekeeper who loved Spanish telenovelas, and I used to watch them with her. I might have stored some of the conversations in my subconscious. That could be true of the other ones as well. Maybe those are dialog from movies that I’ve seen.”
“But you said that they sound real.”
“What if I’m reconstructing scenes from movies and improving on the actors' performances?” She sighed. “I’ve been searching for answers for a very long time. But the problem is that every one I come up with, aside from a mental disorder or a paranormal ability, can be explained away logically. There is no way to prove or disprove that they are real.”
Sam rubbed a hand over the nape of his neck. “I have an idea, and I assure you that it’s not a trick to get you in my bed.”
That piqued her curiosity. “I can’t wait to hear it.”
“I know many languages.” He rubbed his neck again as if it was an embarrassing admission. “If you go to sleep in my bed and hear a conversation in an unfamiliar language, it might be one that I know. You just need to repeat what you’re hearing.”
That was in the same vein of thought as what Margaret had suggested, but it could still be a ploy to get her in his bed.